The 3 step copywriting guide to rubbing it better…

After spending time making sure you paint a vivid picture or your customer’s pain, it would be easy to think that following this with:

“We can solve your problem and make you feel better…”

…would compel your customer to buy.

It’s not bad, but we can do better to show your customer exactly how amazing working with you is going to be. And as all great things come in threes, here are my 3 simple steps.

All we’re going to do is bring to life the joys your customer will experience once you’re through with them.

So, the first step is:

Know where to rub

You already know your customer’s pain, so make sure the benefit of working with you relates directly to that.

Let’s say you provide flower arranging for weddings.

Your customer’s pain is the confusion over what kind of arrangements to choose, wondering how much of the budget will be used up on flowers, trying to find the time to view and order the flowers and also, worrying that the arrangement isn’t going to be as special and as unique as they need on the “big day.”

So, some big areas there that need comforting are:

Saving time

Saving money

Wanting to make an impression

Needing a reliable service

Wanting a personal and helpful service

Think about the pain areas for your customer and write them down on a separate piece of paper so you can see them when you’re writing your copy.

These are the areas you’re going to “rub” and you start to do that when you…

Show your painkillers

When you know what pain areas your customer has, you then need to figure out what parts of your service are the “painkillers” for their problem.

What will you do to solve the pain areas you wrote down before?

List them specifically, and add them to your list.

For example:

Online catalogue and order system to save time

Discounts for advance or bulk orders

Unique bouquets created based on colour and flower preference

Guaranteed response to all enquiries within 15 minutes

Personal consultation over tea and cake

Then, the next step is to add in a dash of feel-good emotion when you…

Show you can make it all better

Then, think of a specific example why this is something they will love.

Taking the examples above, our bride to be would probably be feeling:

Calmer – With the flowers sorted, she can spend more time choosing the dress

Excited – There’s more in the budget for food

Special – All those admiring glances at the bouquet

More relaxed – She doesn’t have to worry about “radio silence” at critical moments

Cared for – She doesn’t have to wait for the big day to feel like a VIP

Then, once you have all of these elements, you just need to put it altogether.

“With plenty to organise for your wedding, we make sure that choosing your flower arrangement is a special piece of your big day that you can enjoy, not worry about. We can visit you at your own home for a personal consultation (and we bring the tea and cake!) where we guide you through picking the perfect bouquet that will make heads turn…”

Now, that’s just an example using only a few of the items we looked at above, you can pick and mix as many as you need in order to make your customer fall in love with your service.

Words to help

If you find yourself struggling to think of words to describe how your customer is going to feel after you’ve worked your magic, here are a few examples from my copywriting phrasebook (soon to be released sign up here if you’d like advance notice) to help you along!

Ability to cope

Have fun

Radiant

Breakthrough

Brighten up

Comfort

More energy

Stand out

Transform from / into

Proud

Part of the group

So there you go, now go and rub your customer’s pain better and let me know how you get on!

You poked your customer’s pain. Now rub it better.

Okay, you took the salt and you rubbed it into your customer’s wound.

Your customer is reading your website thinking

“Oh my word, this person knows exactly just how horrible and awful it is to be me with this godawful problem that I’d do anything to get rid of…”

Then they scroll down further and you tell them that

“We can solve your problem and make you feel better!”

Good right?

Well, it’s okay.

I mean, if your customer’s problem is that they’re strapped to a chair being forced to watch a 5 hour abstract mime theatre production, then just by telling them you can solve their problem is probably going to be big enough for them to hand over their credit card to you.

But, for most people, the problem isn’t as immediate, and they might just ignore what you’re offering because although you did a great job of bringing their problem to life, you haven’t fully convinced them that they’re going to feel better.

Telling them they will feel better isn’t enough.

We need to get vivid again, you need to put an arm around your customer and show them enthusiastically, all the wonderful ways their life will be improved when they’re finished working with you.

Don’t offer …. Know where to rub

Your customer might not care a jot about what other people think of her, but she might be incredibly passionate about the environment, so you wouldn’t encourage her to donate because “everyone else is doing it” Alternatively, your customer might like feeling part of a community and so other people’s actions might be persuasive enough for her to take action.

Powerufl motivating factors include:

Looking good

Feeling good

Having other people admire you

Avoiding pain

Feeling special

Saving time

Saving money

Have a think about your customer. What makes her feel good?

Don’t assume your customer knows what their life looks like without their pain

You’ve spent a while building up a picture fo their pain but don’t assume your csustomer is going to know what their life will be like without that pain.

That’s ot because they don’t know, it’s ebcasue you’ve not asked them to think about it which is what we need to do to have them associate feeling better with your product or service.

Focus on how they will feel

Picture your customer after you have worked together. What have you just done for them?

You built them a website

Why did they care about this?

Because they didn’t have the time or knowledge to do it

So you saved them time, and you solved their confusion

How this changed their life

Now, what has happened to their life since they got their website?

They’re no longer trawling the internet looking for a website developer they trust they have more time to work on their business

Their business has increased credibility due to a professional looking site

How has this made them feel?

More confident

More relaxed due to more time

Less stressed

Proud of their business

Renewed excitement in their online presence

Then, you need to start putting these bits together that shows them, what you did, what that means to them and how that’s going to make them feel.

So, after you’ve poured salt on the wound, when you rub it better, it’s going to start looking like this:

“I’ll work with you personally to design the blueprint for your new website, so you can be certain that you’ll get everything you want. Not sure what you want exactly? Don’t worry, I’ve been building sites for more than 10 years so I can give you some hints and tips about some nifty designs and features I think you’ll love.

Then just leave it to me and within 10 days you’ll be unveiling your shiny new website to the world. It’s not only going to feel good to get it crossed off your to do list, but when it attracts more traffic, compliments and business, you’re going to want to tell everyone you know to go and visit your website, knowing you don’t have to feel embarrassed or make up any excuses any more. “

It’s all about rubbing it better and proving to your customer that you know what you’re talking about, and not just promising them that they will feel good because anyone can do that.

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About Amy Harrison

I am a copywriter, content-trainer, speaker and filmmaker teaching businesses how to avoid drab business content and write copy customers love to read. You can also find me hanging out and sharing content over on Google+.

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